Pakistan to seek arrest of ex-president Musharraf

[JURIST] Pakistan authorities pledged Tuesday to arrest former president Pervez Musharraf [BBC profile; JURIST news archive] for his alleged involvement in the assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto [BBC obituary; JURIST news archive]. Interior Minister Rehman Malik [official website] said [CNN news report] that the "government is moving for his red notice" which is an Interpol [official website] international arrest warrant. Interpol did not yet provide any comments concerning this issue. Bhutto was assassinated in 2007 in a suicide attack at a rally in Rawalpindi after she returned from her exile [JURIST reports] in Great Britain and Dubai.

In November, an anti-terrorism court in Pakistan indicted seven people [JURIST report] in assassination of former prime minister. Among the indicted people were two senior police officers who allegedly were negligent in providing adequate security [Al Jazeera report] to Bhutto. The other five men were charged with criminal conspiracy. At that time, Musharraf was not charged despite allegation that he did play a part of the assassination. However, his property was seized [JURIST report] by the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) [official website] after an order rendered by Pakistani Judge Shahid Raffique due to Musharraf's failure to respond to multiple subpoenas. Those documents were issued because the FIA accused [JURIST report] Musharraf in the assassination of Bhutto. In 2010, an independent UN commission blamed [JURIST report] Pakistani government and police forces for the assassination because they "lacked a comprehensive security plan."

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